Brittney Griner was sent to a Russian penal colony and began serving her sentence.
Moscow:
Basketball star Brittney Griner has been sent to a remote Russian penal colony and is beginning her sentence, her lawyers said on Thursday.
“Brittney has started serving her sentence at IK-2 in Mordovia,” lawyers Maria Blagovolina and Alexander Boykov said in a statement.
“We visited him earlier this week. Brittney is doing as expected and trying to stay strong while adapting to a new environment.”
The US athlete was sentenced to nine years in prison in August for possession of e-cigarette cartridges containing small amounts of cannabis oil, after being arrested at Moscow airport in February.
The 32-year-old actor’s trial came amid fierce tensions between Moscow and Washington over Russia’s military offensive in Ukraine.
The IK-2 penal colony is located in the village of Yavaş, in the central region of Mordovia, which is known for its harsh climate.
IK stands for “corrective colony”, the most common type of prison in Russia.
According to the Russian Federal Penitentiary Service, IK-2 houses more than 800 inmates living in barracks.
Mordovia is also home to the IK-17 colony, where Paul Whelan, a retired US Marine, was imprisoned after being convicted for espionage and sentenced to 16 years in prison in 2020.
His family says he was abused and fell asleep there.
Russian penal colonies are known for their harsh treatment of inmates, their unsanitary conditions and lack of access to proper healthcare.
Conditions in penal colonies are much harsher than in detention centres.
Activists say harassment and torture are common in Russia’s vast prison network, the successor to the notorious Gulag system of the Stalin process.
When Griner was arrested, the two-time Olympic basketball gold medalist and Women’s NBA champion was in Russia to play for the veteran Yekaterinburg team during her timeout at the Phoenix Mercury.
He admitted to the charges, simply saying that he did not intend to break the law or use the substance banned in Russia.
Griner stated that he had obtained permission from a US doctor to use medical marijuana to relieve the pain of many of his wounds and that he had not failed any drug tests.
The use of medical marijuana is not allowed in Russia.
(Except for the title, this news was not edited by an NDTV employee and aired from a syndicated feed.)
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